Anna Karenina is a story of split, conflict, schism and division. Anna's battle for love, her struggle between what she needs and what she wants, her hatred of lies and their use, her oscillation between libre penseur - liberal values ​​- and old patriarchal and moral values - reinforce the theme of internal conflict leading to inevitable destruction. Leo Tolstoy, however, in a brilliant stroke of genius, uses the seemingly insignificant remark made by a passerby about the death of a guard in the first section of the book to elicit the overarching theme of brutal division in Anna's struggle for love. By using a death to gain insight into a love story, Tolstoy reveals his ability to weave seemingly isolated and disjointed instances into the plot of the overall work in a style so unique that it makes Matthew Arnold's tribute to the novel true: “ We are not taking Anna Karenina as a work of art; we must take it as a piece of life. Tolstoy, in fact, creates life in a book, transforming it into a place full of vitality and strength. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay The fascinating nature of the work lies in the way Tolstoy ties the novel together through an intrinsic and subtle organizational thread, where seemingly outlined ideas are brought together in functional coherence, a concept Tolstoy calls the “labyrinth of connections ”. This idea is ingeniously expressed by Richard F. Gustafson in “Leo Tolstoy: Resident and Stranger,” where he writes that “Tolstoy organizes his work according to a principle of inner spirit that unites not by logical connection but by a unity inherent in variety. " (Gustafson 281). Establishing the “inner spirit” in the novel is what brings Anna Karenina to life. Just as the current binds the voluminous speed of the young river, it is this “unity inherent in variety” that holds the novel together. key to deciphering the work, therefore, lies in understanding how, as Tolstoy says, “images, actions and situations” (Gustafson 281) work in collaboration with the overall plot The entirely isolated and unrelated episode of the death of a guard thus becomes an important key to understanding the conflict that prevails in the novel as a predominant theme. This article argues that although the death of a guard during the first meeting between Anna and Vronsky at the St. Petersburg railway station (I, xviii) is a seemingly disparate and isolated incident, however, through a careful analysis of the "images, actions and situations" employed in the scene, we find the key to understanding the dark, destructive and divisive nature of Anna's battle for a love that is displaced in society in which Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina is set. of the guard's death is an important link in understanding the nature of Anna's adulterous love for Vronsky. Set in a crowded St. Petersburg train station, the accident represents the novel's first death and coincides with Anna and Vronsky's first meeting. A physical death thus becomes the harbinger of Anna Karenina's spiritual death. Not only are the railway and the city of St. Petersburg one of the repetitive symbols of Anna Karenina, but they have a special meaning in the symbolism of the death of the guard. St. Petersburg is the city of modern, liberal values ​​and the home of the followers of comme il faut – where everyone does what everyone else does and individuality and spirituality are not central to the lives of its inhabitants. Furthermore, the station is the exact opposite of nature: here the dark and imposing forms of metal and industry flourish instead of thescenic beauty of nature. It is here, in a city marked by hypocrisy and physicality, and in a station marred by ugliness, that a guard finds himself crushed to death and Anna and Vronsky's unfortunate love story begins. The station is described in the following words in chapter xvii, part one: "The approach of the train was more and more evident from the preparatory bustle in the station, from the influx of porters, from the movement of the policemen and orderlies, and from the people who met the train... You could hear the hiss of the boiler on the distant tracks, and the rumble of something heavy." In the next chapter, Tolstoy describes the scene in which the guard is crushed under the train, like this: "Just as they were getting out of the carriage, several men suddenly ran by with shocked faces. The stationmaster also ran by with his extraordinary colorful cap. Evidently something unusual had happened. The crowd that had gotten off the train was rushing back.” The words “hustle,” “hurry,” and “movement” used in chapter xvii all stir up frenetic activity in the station. , where important-looking men in uniform – doormen, policemen and orderlies – are all in a lively bustle The “heavy” train, the reason for all this fuss, is approaching the station menacingly – it is menacing with its “roar”. while the “distant” boiler emits an evil “hissing” Also, in the same chapter, the words “trembling,” “hanging low,” “frost,” “bent figure,” “whining,” “swaying,” and “swaying.” they have been effectively used to create a miserable image of an inhospitable country. station, where happiness is non-existent and darkness prevails. There is "strong frost" and a man was "crushed" by the moving train. The “mutilated corpse” and the talk of the “horrific death” increase the bleak tone. The dark language not only foreshadows the death of the guard, but also the fatally destructive meeting of Anna and Vronsky. Tolstoy uses an anaphoric device in which similar words are repeated consecutively to emphasize the importance of a particular theme. In this case, the station is connected to Anna's struggle for love, tying it to the theme of destructive desperation. It is this element of dark and destructive darkness that is the “inner spirit” that links the isolated station of St. Petersburg with Anna's experience of love. Indeed, the fulfillment of her physical desire with Vronsky in Chapter sank from the ground. the sofa where she was sitting, on the floor, at her feet." Furthermore, the repeated use of the words "guilty", "sinful", "humiliation", "horror", "terrible", "revolting", "scary", “shame,” “pity,” “contempt,” and “despair,” all wrapped up together in one short chapter, reinforce the disgust and shame that Anna feels that was to be the reward of her passion for Vronsky is described in terms of punishment and desperation, and the language serves to reinforce this sense of loss. David H. Stewart in his article “Anna Karenina: The Dialectic of Prophecy” delves into how an individual episode is connected to the overall theme of Anna Karenina: “ The power of the (individual) episode comes not only from the way Tolstoy conceived but from the stylistic presentation in which poetic and rhetorical techniques help to activate many areas of the reader's mind and in this way distribute his response over an area of broader and more generalized experience” (Stewart 268). In this case, through the use of language, in particular anaphora, two isolated situations were intertwined with a thin thread in the mosaic of the general theme ofAnna's desperation. In addition to the darkness of the setting, the atmosphere at the station is one of utter confusion, a feverish rush akin to doomsday. This chaos is the crowd's immediate response when they realize that "something unusual" has happened, in this case the death of the guard. The terrified people running aimlessly through the station, without yet knowing what happened, create a situation of intimate contact that seems absurd and out of place. Anna and Vronsky, however, experience love at first sight precisely in this context, which marks the beginning of their love story as an absurd and out of place event compared to the social environment in which they live, highlighting the socially unacceptable nature of their Love. The public humiliation that follows the Anna-Vronsky romance is also foreshadowed in this scene. “People coming in were still talking about what happened.” (I, xviii) Also in this case the detail was used to explain the general theme. The element of sensation among the crowd over the death has been amplified many times and transformed into scandalous gossip as it is projected in Anna's relationship with Vronsky. The audience's attention, its scrutiny of the characters' actions, and its systematic banishment of society's “criminals” are a dominant feature of Anna's destruction. She resents being ostracized by the Russian society of which she was once a part in an endearing way, especially when she speaks of her public humiliation at the opera, “Unpleasant…horrible! As long as I live I will never forget it. He said it was a shame to sit next to me. (V, xxxiii) The public disgrace that mortifies Anna is in stark parallel to the “chatter” at the station. However, while the dead guard is unaware that he is on the subject in town, Anna, being alive and sensitive to the gossip surrounding her, finds it torturous to deal with it. Tolstoy once wrote in response to a critic that Anna Karenina is a piece of architecture in which "the vaults are joined in such a way that one does not notice where the keystone is." In addition to creating specific situations that draw connections to the novel's general themes, Tolstoy used recurring images throughout the text that belie the presence of a centrally embedded and binding keystone within the structural design of Anna Karenina. Indeed, images are dispersed throughout the novel at crucial plot points, and when the threads of these images are joined together, a magnificent fresco is created. The images of the station scene from Part I, Chapter XIII are crucial features in the painting depicting Anna's love story with Vronsky. The symbols of the train, the “gagged” guard, and the “mutilated corpse” are used effectively to describe the death of the guard, while simultaneously drawing connections to elicit an understanding of Anna's love conflict. The train is a symbol of brutal destruction and irreconcilable division. The train is "heavy" and threatening; it is the harbinger of industrialization and modernity that introduced liberal values ​​to Russia, corrupting its spiritual soul. The train is a recurring image of destruction whose main function is to divide – metaphorically and literally. While the guardian was literally “cut in two pieces,” the train symbolizes the advent of modernity and European ideas of physicality, which served to divide Anna. Like Russia, Anna was divided physically and spiritually. The guard's end was violent, drawing parallels to the violent nature of Anna's adulterous relationship with Vronsky: she tears herself from the comfortable social position she enjoys and launches herself down the dangerous path of adultery. In physical and spiritual terms, howas a result she was “cut in two”. She is torn between the need to have a satisfying family and the desire to have a passionate love life. The violently divisive nature of his love clearly emerges as a dominant characteristic and is heavily reflected in the death of the crushed guard. The image of the “gagged” guardian is another example of a link connecting the specific to the general. Tolstoy describes the guard's death in a simple but striking sentence: "A guard, drunk or too gagged in the biting cold, had not heard the train retreat and was crushed." This sentence is full of strands of Anna Karenina's overarching themes. The train, the brutal destruction, Anna's “hushed” insensitivity, and the unfavorable conditions of the “biting cold” environment all resonate in this clever phrase. The guard is oblivious to his surroundings and parallels can be drawn with Anna's obliviousness to her husband's feelings and society's condemnation as she carries on the affair. She, like the “drunk” guard, is too caught up in the passionate physicality of Vronsky's love to fail to take into account how serious her situation is. For example, in Chapter XXIII, Part II, Anna is “terrified of what she had done” when she thinks of “her son and his future attitude towards his mother.” However, he tries to "reassure himself with false arguments" and forces himself to imagine that "everything would remain as before". Anthony Thorlby writes that Anna's thoughts toward herself belie a sense of “pressure of unspoken considerations, of evasions and pretenses” (Thorlby 60). Her inability to think about her situation in practical terms and to remain "stuck" in her own world is one of the main reasons for the conflict to which her conscience is subject. As Gustafson says, “Anna is not punished by Tolstoy for her sexual satisfaction. In a fuller sense, Anna's story is a self-enclosed moral tragedy... in her search for love, she hides from her own truth. (Gustafson 132). Her terror of experiencing the worst possible scenario leads her to underestimate the gravity of her situation. Anna is not honest with herself and, unable to face reality, feels crushed like the guard who doesn't realize that the train "is going back". Anna's love for Vronsky was, in fact, surrounded by the cold and unwelcome snare of Russian society, and was fueled by Anna's blind ignorance of the consequences of her illicit passions. In the end, just like the guardian, Anna remains "crushed", both physically and spiritually. The image of the "mutilated corpse" is disturbing, not only for the characters present at the station, but also because the image returns to haunt the moment in which Anna consummated her relationship with Vronsky. At the station Oblonsky is distressed at the sight of the body; not only does he become “obviously distressed”, but he frowns and is “ready to cry”. His repeated moans of “How horrible!” and “Anna, if I had seen it!”, implying the horrendous nature of the deformed corpse. The body, we later learn, is “cut in two pieces” and is distorted beyond repair. In chapter xi of part II we see the fulfillment of Anna's physical desire delimited by the image of a lifeless body falling at the feet of her killer. Vronsky has fulfilled "the only wish of his life", yet he feels "what a murderer must feel when he sees the body from which he has deprived of life". Instead of ecstatic euphoria, there is a deep sense of shame. In Anna he sees the proof of his crime – and “despite all the murderer's horror at the body of his victim, he must tear it to pieces”. The murderous brutality of the guard's death resonates in this scene, where Anna, the object of Vronsky's love, iscompared to a dead, lifeless corpse that must be mercilessly torn to pieces. Anna died before she died. It has become the “mutilated corpse” that invokes pity and horror in its viewers. Just as Oblonsky is moved by how “horrible” the guard's corpse was, Anna also pleads for mercy for his shameful condition. The image of the guard's corpse, therefore, is powerful in its ability to connect with the fate of Anna's love. Tolstoy, with his keen observation of the smallest details, describes the actions and expressions of his characters in such a way as to serve to reveal significant truths about the individual character or the society that particular character represents. Tolstoy is a master at depicting the smallest details and changes in his characters and, with his propensity to form a subtle web of connections throughout the plot, skillfully links the particular to the general. By looking closely at how the characters behave at the station in Chapter XVIII, Part I, one can draw important connections for understanding the nature of the Anna-Vronsky love story. Through Vronsky's eyes, Tolstoy gives us a detailed view of Anna Karenina's exquisitely charming facial expressions, as we, together with Vronsky, see her for the first time. Aside from the beauty of his features, what fascinates Vronsky is the liveliness of his expressions, “the repressed enthusiasm that played on his face and flirted between his bright eyes and the faint smile that curved his red lips.” His eyes and smile are enchanting to see. However, in addition to the beauty of her charm, her "repressed" nature is also revealed during the chapter. , and now in his smile. He deliberately hid the light in his eyes, but it shone against his will in the barely perceptible smile. “Once again, Tolstoy uses anaphora to convey a sense of the restrictions and limitations of Anna's life. Life in its nature reveals itself “against its will”, “overflows” out of its depths, struggling to express itself. She “enveloped” this life, “deliberately” pushing it back into her, but it resisted her efforts and once again “shined against her will” in its “barely perceptible smile.” The repetition of words and phrases that elicit Anna's struggle to contain the life within her give us an idea of ​​the restraint she has become accustomed to over the years of her marriage to Alexey Karenin. It seems that, after years of repression, he allows himself to live for the first time: "As he spoke he let the anxiety that insisted on coming out into the open shine through in his smile." A part of her has been locked away for years, and it's in this moment that we see glimpses of it. Interestingly, at this point in the story Vronsky, just like the reader, knows nothing about Anna and how cold and unattractive her husband is. She is unaware of the lack of love she feels towards her husband, or how her femininity has been reduced to the role of dutiful wife and mother. He has not been introduced to the Anna who longs for passionate love, yet in this first glimpse of Anna, Tolstoy gets a peek into her sober life. Indeed, Anna's battle for love revolves around this very repression she feels within her marriage and her lack of fulfillment in her married life. The failure of the marriage is the cause of the destructive romance – a bond that is actually established from the very first meeting between the star-crossed lovers. Countess Vronsky is another prominent character of the scene, whose actions and gestures reveal the threatening nature of Russian society. Tolstoy uses a surprisingly effective choice of words to introduce this lady into the novel: "Her mother, a dry old lady with black eyes and.